


Multiplex

by NazcaRun



Category: Worth the Candle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:27:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 8,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NazcaRun/pseuds/NazcaRun
Summary: Life has many doors, Joon-boy.Contains spoilers forWorth the Candleup to around chapter 120.
Kudos: 27





	1. Nexus

It had been a hard few hours. Waking up aboard a plane, being thrown off that same plane, fighting for my life. The weird game was alright, I supposed. Better than the life I had left behind.

Outside Comfort’s top (and only) mechanics shop, I found myself at a crossroads of sorts. What was I looking for, really?

> [A dutiful dwarf](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234038)  
> [A loyal elf](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234272)  
> [A deer friend](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234434)  
> [TypeError: Cannot read property ‘epithet' of undefined](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234485)  
> [A goal-oriented princess](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11478249/chapters/25816869)  
> [A homely girl](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234557)  
> [An old librarian](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62234659)


	2. Grakhuil

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. Standing by the furthest wall from my position, was… 

A dwarf, with rough features and a braided beard died gray. He was holding a wand, with an axe by his side.

Between us, a laid out wire on the floor.

“This room has been warded. Do not cross the wire if you wish to live,” the dwarf said.

“It’s fine, I just want to talk.” I took a step back, still keeping my eye on him. “I didn’t see you on the plane,” I said inquiringly.

“I did not arrive by plane,” he replied.

I waited for him to elaborate, but that proved to be fruitless task. I spoke again, “So if you’re not here for this… trial, what brings you here?”

He examined me with a careful eye, a process that lasted an uncomfortable amount of time. Whatever he was looking for, he found it.

“Gold,” he finally said, “Left behind at Silmar City.”

Gold? I had no idea what Silmar City was (besides a city, of course), but presumably it was near here. 

“Hold on, let’s backtrack a little here,” I said. “I’m Juniper Smith, student, trying to get out of this exclusion zone. You?”

“Grakhuil Leadbraids.” His voice took an edge. “I studied for ten years at Barriers.”

“Nice to meet you, but is that supposed to mean anything to me?” I said.

Grakhuil stared at me like I was an idiot. “The Athenaeum of 

Barriers. I would soon be expected to become a warding magus, in normal circumstances.”

“Okay. This must be hard to believe, but I’ve been suffering some kind of amnesia since the plane and I don’t know what warding is. From context, I’m assuming it’s some kind of magical barrier?” That could range from trivial to terrifying, depending on the consequences for crossing them.

Grakhuil seemed to be working out some things in his head as he spoke. “You seem to believe what you are saying. Amnesia is not the only explanation. The Empire is not all-encompassing.”

I waited for him to get to the point, but he just turned around and continued drawing shapes in the air with his wand.

“So, can we join forces and get out of here? I could help you in exchange for some help getting out,” I offered. I would get closer to the wire, but the mention of magical barriers had made me understandably hesitant—intentionally misaligning wire and ward would have been one of the first things I would do to trick my enemies, were I a warder. I also hoped he wouldn’t realize I had almost no useful skills—

“Whatever the cause, you would be a hindrance. I am not in a position to offer charity,” said Grakhuil.

So much for that. The time was desperate, so I had no choice but to tell him about the interface.

“I do have a special ability that could be useful. I’m in something of an unique situation, maybe you’ve heard of it.” I considered how to best put it. “Whenever I use a skill, I get better at it fast, magically so. I was able to get good enough with a machete to trivialize killing zombies in a few minutes, having never held one. The ability also gives me some indirect information about the world, I think. I unlocked the skill ‘Deception’ while getting here, and that let me know I wasn’t alone.”

“In the future, do not use that word,” said Grakhuil.

“What, Deception?” I asked, confused.

“The Z-word,” he replied.

“Okay, sorry. I don’t know the proper word. Undead?” I had to admit, while many fictional worlds had an excuse to avoid the word ‘zombie’, ostensibly so people could take the plot more seriously, making it a slur was a novel one. 

Grakhuil nodded. “I have never heard of this ability. Can you provide proof?”

I thought for a second, but nothing came to mind. “Maybe you could teach me this warding thing and see if I pick it up fast?”

That seemed to be the wrong thing to say, as his eyes took on a harder cast.

“I have no time for this. Leave, and come back only if you have something tangible to show me,” Grakhuil said. He raised his wand menacingly. I still didn’t know how wary I should actually be, if at all, but I decided to be conservative.

“Okay, I’ll be right back.” I said. Asshole.

“You do that,” Grakhuil said.

I left the way I had come in. Immediately after doing that, I realized the door would have been the perfect spot to put a ward in, if I wanted to kill a retreating enemy. I was probably lucky the dwarf wasn’t entirely heartless.

As I went out into the reception area, I sat in one of the uncomfortable waiting chairs, studiously ignoring the corpse sitting three chairs away.

What could I do? Dazzle Grakhuil with One-handed Weapons or Athletics? That would hardly be proof of anything. Physical feats? I stared at my hands, and the arms connected to them. With shocked realization, I suddenly had a plan.

* * *

I carefully stalked the alleys, machete in hand.

In the darkness, I saw two points of light, marking my next victim.

Grinding was generally discouraged in tabletop games. The abstractions required for fights were already repetitive enough without having to fight the same kinds of enemies over and over, and there were no story elements involved. Even outside of tabletop, video games often reduced the experience obtained from enemies at a lower level, precisely to stop what I was doing-mindlessly attacking lone enemies whose exact weakness I already knew, over and over.

I hoped the fact _this_ grinding had a purpose beyond the mechanical would help mitigate that. I ran towards the zombie, putting all my momentum behind the machete as I swung it towards its chest.

**_Zombie defeated!_ **

**_Level Up!_ **

I felt more than refreshed. The fatigue and damage from running around for an hour had left my body, replaced with a feeling of contentment, both physical and mental. It made me want to keep killing the undead forever. Of course, nothing good lasted forever, and I touched the ground again, in the dirty alley next to a zombie corpse, feeling like I usually did (which hadn’t been great lately).

It was time to go back to the shop and execute the plan, if you could call it that.

The door opened. Not much had changed since I had left, Grakhuil still working out the kinks of his wand or whatever the hell he was doing.

“I suppose you are here to show me your proof,” the dwarf said. 

He still sounded skeptical, and if I could discern his features from across the room, I’m sure he’d also look tired of my shit.

“I am. Focus on my body, I’m about to do something,” I said dramatically, and closed my eyes.

The character sheet showed up once more. As previously confirmed, the interface showed my stats with a ‘+’ next to them, the results of my frantic grinding.

I paused. All of a sudden it didn’t seem a good idea to put both points into PHY, even looking at my anemic stats. For one, I was now aware of Warding Magic, which seemed incredibly overpowered if the dwarf felt safe where he was, and which I doubted would scale off physical attributes.

The main conundrum was short-term versus long-term benefits: was convincing him right now better than figuring out a better way, and then puting points into whatever stats governed magic (CUN? KNO?).

I knew what Reimer would tell me. MAD—multiple ability dependency—was a complete shitshow balance-wise and would lead to a weak build, if this was that kind of system. As someone with literal skin in the game, the option most likely to ensure my survival pointed in the direction of PHY, considering my current stats.

Either way, it seemed like a catch-22—I probably wouldn’t get a better chance to learn warding any time soon if I didn’t convince Grakhuil in particular. I finally decided to put both points into PHY, watching the stat rise to 4 and its substats to 3.

I opened my eyes. The dwarf was holding his wand and staring at the wall to his right.

“Well? Do you believe me now?” I asked, annoyed.

“What?” said Grakhuil, in a similar tone of voice. He turned around to face me.

I stared at him, befuddled. I instantly realized what was going on, but I didn’t want to accept it.

“I, I can’t believe this. Were you not paying attention? I told you to look!”

“I did pay attention, for several minutes. Nothing occurred. Perhaps you can try again.” There was no way I had actually taken several minutes. This was ludicrous.

“I don’t have any more points! I _can’t_ do it again!”

“Then you are out of luck.” Grakhuil turned his head and started making circular motions with his wand.

“Don’t I look slightly more muscular than before? Come on, Grakhuil, look at my muscles!”

“I have work to do.” Whatever the limit of the dwarf’s patience was, it had been crossed. He waved the wand at me, and I was pressed backwards, against the frame of the door. Was this a ward? It seemed Grakhuil had the ability to move it once it had been set, if the line on the floor was its original location.

I thought of what I could say or do to prove I really had special powers, but honestly, what did I even have to offer to someone who could do something like this?

I was useless.

I walked away, deciding to find other allies. On the way out, I examined the corpse with the gaping chest wound for resources, but found nothing of use. What a waste of time this had all been.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	3. Fenn

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. 

Standing near the furthest wall from my position, was… 

A pretty elf. Short, blonde hair, green eyes, dressed in army fatigues. Aiming a bow at me. I took a step back, but she had already seen me, obviously.

She relaxed the bow’s string, and said “Come in! I’m friendly!” 

Maybe she had seen that I was only armed with a rusty machete, or maybe it was a trap. The bow was huge, and while it didn’t seem like it could be drawn quickly, it was possible my assumptions would be handwaved away with magic-it was exactly the kind of visual subversion I liked to use in my games.

I decided to go in anyway. It’s not like she couldn’t follow me and kill me if I ran, and I desperately needed all the help I could get.

I fully opened the door and carefully walked into the room. The elf had clearly been ransacking the place, with a number of scraps around her, but she either hadn’t found anything useful or it had already been hidden on her person.

The elf extended her hand when I got close to her, without a single hint of fear on her face. “The name’s Fenn Greenglass. I notice you’ve been staring at my ears, without even knowing my name.” She winked. “That’s not very polite of you.”

I took her hand and shook it. Her grip was surprisingly strong, but not painfully so.

“I’m sorry if that’s some kind of faux pas, this is the first time I’ve seen an elf,” I said, worried I was already screwing things up.

“Faux pas? You’re already going native?” said Fenn, raising an eyebrow. I had no idea what she meant by that. “And you’ve never seen an elf before? I’m a half-elf, actually. Maybe if I smiled more, you’d get it?” 

She did so, but her teeth looked normal, barring a blinding white I had come to expect from Hollywood movie stars and not the average girl on the street. 

Her smile slowly went away as I failed to react. 

I tried to explain. “It’s a long story, but I don’t even really know what being an elf means outside of probably inaccurate assumptions.”

“What, are you from one those remote hooman ethnostates that literally live under rocks?” Fenn said, visibly confused. She seemed to be trying to discern what the joke was.

Being sincere was probably the way to go here. I suspected I wasn’t going to be able to keep any lies up for long around this girl.

“I can’t remember anything since I fell from the sky. I have no idea what’s going on. I have no memories of this world, but I have memories of this  _ other  _ world, and some of the concepts I remember from there seem to match to concepts in here. This could be how my amnesia is manifesting, but I think something weirder is going on here.” I was talking too fast, and I tried to slow down. “It’s all rather confusing. I understand if you don’t want to stick with me. I can fight, though. I seem to be discovering some fighting skills.” I motioned to the machete in my hand in what I hoped was a confident fashion.

Fenn seemed to ruminate on my story. I felt pressure building in my chest, while I prepared for the worst. I didn’t even know the direction I should be walking in to escape from Comfort.

Finally, she spoke. “I believe you.”

“Wait, seriously?” I said, flabbergasted.  _ I  _ wouldn’t have believed me.

“Stranger things have happened,” she said with a smile. “Uther Penndraig said that, you know.” Her expression shifted, becoming thoughtful, “I think I have heard of something like this before, memories of a different world…”

My brain crashed. “Uther Penndraig?”

She seemed to think I was making a joke, but she realized I was seriously asking after the silence became uncomfortable. “Uh, yeah. The Lost King? Oh, I guess you wouldn’t know, being amnestic. Is that a word?”

“What can you tell me about this Uther?” I asked, hiding the obsessive need I felt.

“I wish we could stay and chat, but I do have things to do, you know. My fireteam is waiting for me at Silmar City.” She looked at my inquiring face, and answered the unspoken question. “Long story short, the helicopter we used got hit by, and I quote, ‘unknown projection layer phenomena’ and I was deemed the lowest priority team member. I weigh more than I look. We  _ were _ meant to drop into the exclusion zone, but not that soon. I guess that’s not that short a story, but you’re not listening to me anyway, are you?”

I was indeed only vaguely listening.

Was Arthur here? It would be the only thing that would make this bullshit worth th—“Ow!” I yelped. “Did you just slap me?”

“We need to move, hooman.” Fenn’s expression had turned serious. “Danger is coming. If you want to come with me, drop that machete and pick up this sword. I took it off that asshole at the lobby.” I had no idea how she knew we had to move (maybe elves had super hearing?), but it’s not like I had a choice. A helicopter had been mentioned, and I recognized a plot hook when I saw one. 

I dropped the rusty machete on a nearby table, and she handed me a surprisingly well crafted blade (to my uneducated eye) with a simple black hilt. I held the straight sword with my two hands experimentally.

**_Skill unlocked: Two-handed Weapons!_ **

I had seen this happen with my machete, but it was still nice that simply holding a weapon unlocked a brand new skill. Maybe things were finally working out in the survival department.

At Fenn’s direction, and with the weapon still in my hand we headed out through the lobby (and yes, I did check the corpse for a scabbard. No luck, which was going to get annoying real fast).

Thing only got unluckier once we made our way to the streets of Comfort. A full-scale battle was going on at the furthest end from our location, a giant  _ thing  _ made out of corpses like the world’s most fucked up jigsaw puzzle in one side, a group of four teenagers on the other.

If this was a game, then this was an obvious setup for a boss fight. In practice, I didn’t want to get involved. This felt like it needed explosives, or individually killing every zombie composing the creature. Considering how fast it was moving, and how it was ignoring all gunfire coming from one of the teenagers, I thought we had no chance of meaningfully damaging it. I turned back to Fenn to tell her we should go, but it seemed she already had a plan.

“Get behind me, Juniper, now!” said Fenn as she aimed her bow, taking a deep breath and holding it. 

I didn’t know why she couldn’t just aim carefully, but I realized as she let the arrow loose, and it split in two arrows in mid air, then again, and again, until a cloud of arrows swallowed up the far side of the street.

A terrible noise filled my ears, that of skin being punctured. Not one living thing remained. 

I wanted the zombies dead as much as she did, but… corpses littered the street, zombie and human alike. “Did you, did you just kill everyone?”

“I don’t know what memories you have, but this is a life-or-death situation. It’s us or them,” said Fenn, raising an eyebrow. She seemed affronted I even brought it up.

“It’s not! We could have just run away. You can’t just kill innocent people!” I retorted angrily. With a pang of guilt, I recognized one of the corpses as the guy who had asked us to cooperate, back in the plane.

“If they were innocent, they wouldn’t have ended up here, Juniper. I don’t think you’ll find a single innocent person in the entire Zone.” Fenn was unmoved.

“I am innocent!” I defended myself.

“Are you? Even if you’ve lost your memories, Anglecynn is known for sending its most violent criminals in trials by adversity. It’s the whole point, so they can be useful to the Host if they prove themselves.” She spoke the last part with disgust in her voice.

“Is that what you really believe, or is that just what you’re telling yourself to justify taking the easy way out?” I said.

Fenn’s nerves were clearly already frayed, for this made her blow up at me. “I have had  _ enough _ of your sanctimonious bullshit, Juniper. If you don’t like it, then find your own way out of here.”

“Maybe I will,” I said.

“Yeah?” said Fenn. She looked angry.

“Yeah,” I said, surprised that I meant it.

I knew it was stupid. I should swallow my pride and go along with the crazy woman in this life-or-death situation. But something about her rubbed me off the wrong way. Perhaps it was the fact she clearly didn’t care I was a ‘violent criminal’, or that she implicitly dismissed herself as innocent.

Whatever it was, I had the suspicion that her fireteam was no better, and that I would be dead like these people once I got in the way.

I slowly walked to one of the victims, a muscular guy my age with a blonde buzz cut, and kneeled down. He was long dead, skewered by a few arrows. He was probably trying to fight his way out when Fenn took the shot.

He held a rifle ( **_Skill unlocked: Rifles!_ ** _ ) _ , which was still loaded, judging from the chamber. Hopefully, this would be enough to get me out of here. I’d figure something out. 

Under Fenn’s stare, I walked away from the carnage, securing the rifle around my shoulder, feeling less hopeful by the minute.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	4. Solace

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. 

Standing by one of the walls of the shop was… 

A short green-skinned woman, wearing a cloak of leaves.

* * *

Introductions and a surprising amount of exposition followed.

“So, let me get this straight. You’re a druid, and you’ve been keeping your place of power—this ‘locus’—hidden away in a diminished form for three hundred years while you looked for people that could help reverse its situation. And this Deep Searching led you to me?” I sighed. “I don’t know if you’ve realized, but it’ll be a while before I can help myself, let alone do something an entire grove of druids couldn’t figure out.”

“There is no doubt the spell succeeded, or I wouldn’t be here to speak with you,” replied Solace.

“It would have killed you if it didn’t find anyone?” I asked the crantek, alarmed.

“Indeed.” She replied, smiling. “I was worried when I was brought here, given the location. There are fates worse than death for a locus, as the Second Empire proved many a time. But the ritual’s wording was as exact as the magic would allow, and it led me to you,” Solace said.

I had further inquiries, but it began to become clear, why only Solace was here and not a huge contingent of druids. Contrary to what my friends thought, I knew the concept of tact existed, sometimes. 

Solace had a question herself. “Are you aware of any special circumstances, knowledge or abilities that would allow you to save the locus?”

I had to admit that, while I didn’t think I had any particular druidic skills right now, it would make sense if the interface was my true asset here.

“I’m not sure how it would help the locus, but I have an ability that allows me to acquire new skills at an increased pace. Have you heard of anything like that before?”

Solace shook her head, and hmmed. “Perhaps the key is for you to surpass me as a druid,” she said.

We were under a time pressure. “Whatever it is, I came in here because I’m being chased by a group of people trying to kill me. This is some kind of trial to reach the edge of the zone, I think, but I don’t have half the information. It’s complicated. Can you do anything about that?”

“The locus’ magic could allow us to escape swiftly,” replied Solace.

“They have a lot of guns. It’s like they’re mercenaries or something. Is whatever magic you have immune to gunfire?” I held up my hands and backed up at her unamused look. “I’m really grateful for any help you can give me, don’t get me wrong.”

I didn’t know how to play this, or even if I should play it at all. I wanted to stay alive, learn more about the interface and the world, and help this woman, in that order. Luckily, it looked like joining her would solve all those problems at once. She seemed nice enough.

“The way of druids does not lend itself to that line of thought,” said Solace.

I knew where she was going with this, and therein lay the problem. “I think I get it,” I said honestly. I recognized the design philosophy. I was finally paying the price—the price of coming up with lazy fill-in-your-flavor magic systems to deal with whiny players, that is.

Worst of all, I could feel myself start thinking whiny thoughts. Or was I always like this?

I had a suggestion. “Can you hide us? Maybe the mohawk guys will move on or kill each other if we lay low for a while. I don’t think there’s a time limit in this trial.”

Solace fell deep in thought, and closed her eyes as if consulting with a higher power, which for all I knew might have been the case. After a few minutes, she waved her staff at the wood paneling composing the wall by her side. The wall… opened, for lack of a better word, the panels moving away as if they were vines, then solidifying. As the movement ended, a hole roughly a yard tall remained.

“I don’t know if you can fit in there, but I definitely can’t.” I was pretty sure she knew that, but it didn’t hurt to say.

“Earlier, I said I watched over the last living locus’ domain. I am able to do this because of the Bottle of Manifold Space,” she said, and pulled out a one-gallon glass bottle from inside her leaf cloak, where it clearly didn’t fit. She handed it to me, and though I was put off, I recovered and carefully held it, as if it was the most fragile item in the world.

I examined it in amazement. I had always been fascinated with small worlds, and this was right down my alley. Inside the bottle, an entire ecosystem was playing out in real time. The dreary atmosphere of the mechanics shop desperately tried to ruin the moment, but for the first time since I came to this place, I was experiencing what could only be called whimsy. 

“It’s beautiful,” I told Solace, without taking my eyes off the bottle.

She smiled, and I didn’t get the feeling she was patronizing me. It felt like she was recognizing a fellow appreciator of forests, or something like that.

“Did you make it?” I asked, looking back at her.

Solace spoke gravely. “The locus never reached quite those heights, even back then. This was the result of a desperate effort by a considerable number of warders.” Whatever warders were, they sounded pretty cool. “Coordinated by an extraplanar entity we know little about, against their will.” Okay, nevermind.

At Solace’s direction, I placed the bottle inside the wall.

“What do we do now?” I asked her.

“What do you think we should do?” She calmly riposted, with an expectant look in her eyes.

“We… go inside somehow? Will the wall close automatically?”

“The wall will naturally protect us. It was created with that intent, after all, and a druid can tap into those natural impulses,” she explained.

“Animism?” I asked.

“I can’t say I’ve heard that word before,” replied Solace.

“Animism…” I chose my words carefully, trying not to offend. “The way I understand it, it’s basically the belief that plants and inanimate objects have some kind of spirit, that they’re alive and you can interact with them in some fashion.”

“It isn’t only belief. After all, I was able to ask the wall to make room for us, and you saw the result,” she said. I wanted to call her out on the questionable logic, but she was grinning, clearly knew and didn’t care.

Solace walked away from the wall, and tapped the frame of the door with her staff. Nothing visibly changed. She closed the door and opened it. From where I was standing, it looked like it now lead to the inside of a different room. Inside the bottle?

She motioned with her hand, as if you say ‘you first’. I didn’t really have a choice, not just because of the men with guns, but also because hell if I was going to give up an opportunity to explore the small world inside a magic item.

**_Quest Accepted: Taking Root - The world has but a single druid, tending to but a single locus. With the locus so constrained within a magic bottle, no more druids may be inducted, but removal might prove fatal. With your help, druids might stalk the world once more. (Companion Quest)_ **

Well, that was encouraging.

I told Solace about the Quest, and, as I explored the dwelling (which looked like a tree that had willingly chosen to become a house), Solace reciprocated with her own tale.

It appeared Solace had traveled the entire hex, only settling for the Zorisad Yosivun when she had exhausted every possible solution—understandable, since it would kill her if it failed. As I understood it, the locus was half-alive, unable to do anything beyond providing power to a single druid, not even expand its territory. That was before it was trapped in this bottle to hide it from the Second Empire’s prying eyes. Now, it would need to first be freed from the entad—a term I had learned from Solace—and then healed or strengthened in some novel way. The druids’ list of failed solutions must have taken a vast amount of lifetimes to assemble, and at that moment I wasn’t able to come up with anything new.

Solace and I agreed to call it a night and leave in the early morning. She recommended I slept close by the locus, as she led me to it, to try to establish a rapport. 

I had expected a spirit-like being, not a giant, white deer with six eyes on its face.

Though I actually quite disliked deer, I felt impure, all of a sudden, as if I was sullying the locus by my presence. I saw no judgement in its six eyes, but memories I wanted to ignore came to the forefront of my awareness. Arthur, Tiff, Maddie… I might not have been guilty of any crime on Aerb, but I had things to answer for in the real world. It felt unfair. If this was a typical fantasy game, the hero would have had much lamer, simpler issues. I felt not even the acceptance of a physical embodiment of all things good could redeem me. Of course, from what Solace had told me, the locus was more Neutral than anything else, which calmed my spirit a little.

Solace seemed to sense my discomfort. “This is a place of healing, death, and resurrection. You don’t need to fear me or the locus, whatever you have done.”

I approached the giant deer and, without a conscious decision, placed a hand on it, petting it lightly.

**_Loyalty Increased: Six-Eyed Doe lvl 0!_ **

I looked around to tell Solace about the new development, but she had vanished. 

“Hello there.” I didn’t really know what to say to a doe. “I’m Juniper, what’s your name?”

The doe looked at me and let out a bleat. 

“I see.” I didn’t. “That’s great. What does it mean?”

The doe repeated its bleat.

“Really? That’s pretty meta.” I supposed rolling with the stupid situation might be the way to go. Maybe the doe was meant to be my Chewbacca? That would get old fast. “Give me a second,” I said, and closed my eyes.

As expected, the Companions tab in the interface was now accessible, and the locus was in it, with a greyed out box below its name.

“It seems this game has decided you’re my companion. What do you think about that?” I asked the doe fruitlessly.

* * *

**_Achievement Unlocked: Under the Moon of the First Night_ **

I felt pretty good. The previous night, I had told the locus a little about myself, until it apparently got bored and let me know (in its own way) that I could ride it around the woodlands. I would have thought a noble, mystical creature like a locus wouldn’t like to play the part of a horse, but it seemed I had misjudged it.

We had explored the bottle to the best of my abilities. It was pretty small, with a diameter of around a mile. I wasn’t a claustrophobic person, but I could understand how the doe felt, stuck here for hundreds of years. This show of empathy apparently was enough to “level up” its loyalty. I still don’t know what benefits I got from that, besides the obvious.

We had fallen asleep—or I had, for I didn’t know if the doe even slept—next to the babbling creek, my head against its flank. It reminded me of the nights I had spent camping with friends, back on Earth.

Solace found me like that, and smiled. “I’m glad to see you getting along,” she said. “Thought you can’t see it from here, outside the wall it’s already past dawn. We should leave the zone.”

I could agree with that. In fact, I was feeling downright hopeful about the future. We exited the bottle the way we came, entering the workshop from inside the tree. It was deathly silent.

“So what are we going to do?” I asked Solace, picking up the machete from where I had left it against the wall.

“We are going to transform into sparrows. It should allow us to get to the edge of the Risen Lands unnoticed, bypassing the outpost. Once there, we’ll discuss a more permanent location,” explained Solace. I could agree with that.

Solace tapped me on the head with her staff, then herself. The process of becoming a bird was completely seamless. One moment I was human, the other we were flying out of the shop through a hole in the window. I didn’t see a single living human, though I thought I saw a bigger volume of zombies than the day before.

I had already experienced flight, first piloting a helicopter and then freefalling into a cursed land, but this was different. The shift had come with muscle memory, hollow bones, the surety I could do this, fly as high as I wanted, as fast as I wanted. There was no boundary that separated me from the sky.

Solace had stuck to flying near the ground for some reason, which seemed downright dangerous. I instead shook my wings, lifting me to greater and greater heights, enjoying the feeling of wind pushing against my face, for the first time truly enjoying this adventure.

I never even saw the dragon.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	5. Chapter 5

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. 

A pale girl was waiting for me behind it.

Only my reflexes saved me, closing the door and trapping the incoming arm. The enemy made no noise of pain, and grabbed the edge, undeterred, slowly prying it open against all my efforts. 

I lost the contest of strength, which I excused by the fact I was holding a machete and couldn’t get the best leverage, and got pushed backwards, barely avoiding a fall.

As the grimy door opened again, I examined my opponent carefully, heart hammering in my chest. She looked like a pop culture version of an albino, which wasn’t close to what they really looked like. One of the non-human races I had created? None came to mind at that moment.

As I was opening my mouth to tell her to stop, the girl closed the distance. In a feat of flexibility, she raised her leg and kicked my machete out of my hand, at the same time punching my solar plexus and doubling me over. 

I scuttled backwards and I tried to cover my face with my arms, at the same time the girl leaped towards me.

**_Critical Hit!_ **

**_Skill unlocked: Unarmed Combat!_ **

In a stroke of unimaginable luck, my fist collided with her chin. I uppercutted her, spittle flying out of her mouth. I could not believe my eyes. She must not have weighed much, as she made an arc on the way down, finally landing on the floor, out cold.

**_Null Pointer Exception defeated!_ **

I stared at my right fist, perplexed. Maybe this game wasn’t as bad as I thought. Though, what was the deal with that name? A random glitch, or indication of something more? Was I not meant to beat her, this encounter an unskippable cutscene? Was this the uncomfortable moment of realization in poorly coded RPGs wherein the main quest is broken and you’re left with a broken game after you’ve already saved?

Whatever had happened, I was now faced with the uncomfortable task of dealing with what was, by all appearances, an unconscious, defenseless teenage girl. I didn’t really want to kill her, so that left only a couple of options.

I had a theory. The girl hadn’t seemed  _ inhumanly _ strong, just inhumanly good at fighting. In fact, it seemed like she didn’t have any significant musculature at all, though that didn’t necessarily confirm anything, considering the existence of magic. Something in this store could probably hold her.

I rummaged through the tables and cabinets of the mechanics shop until I finally found it-a spool of wire. I carried the unconscious girl onto the closest it wooden chair, placed her in a sitting position, and faced the challenge of remembering a good knot.

A shoelace knot probably wouldn’t do. The following few minutes proved (excruciatingly) that I really should have researched prisoner holding methods in more detail, especially when ‘you’re tied to a chair, your interrogator has left the room, figure out how to escape’ was one of my go-to plot devices.

After I was done, I realized I didn’t remotely trust the knot I had made. I also didn’t really want to torture her for information. What the fuck was I even doing?

Even if I woke her up and she was friendly. I somehow doubted I could get another critical hit in, if she decided to turn on me at any point. I was desperate, but not that kind of desperate, not when I’d seen death in her eyes.

Making a decision, I got up from my kneeling position. I kind of felt bad leaving her tied up, but hey, she did try to kill me for no reason. A brief unsettling search later confirmed her lack of weaponry, or any possessions whatsoever besides her clothes. 

Annoyed at the lost time, I walked out of the shop.

I was already down the street outside as two notifications appeared in front of my eyes.

**_Affliction: Cowardice lvl 3! (WIS -2, POI -2, END -1)_ **

“God, fucking, damn it!” I wanted to kick something.

I was at zero in both Wisdom and Poise. Apparently that didn’t kill me, which was the only silver lining to the horrible situation I suddenly found myself in. I had barely been able to fight off a zombie with Endurance at 2, and depending on how stats scaled I might not be able to do it again in my current state.

As if reality could read my thoughts, I saw a dozen zombies heading down my way, passing my previous location. 

My only hope? Was this the game throwing me a bone, telling me ‘hey, you can fix your affliction if you face this clearly unbeatable encounter’?

Fuck that. I was going to play this smart instead of letting the interface run my life. I turned and ran from the zombies like my life depended on it, which it clearly did.

**_Achievement Unlocked: Refusal of the Call_ **

**_Affliction: Cowardice lvl 4! (WIS -3, POI -3, END -2)_ **

I didn’t enjoy the notification for long.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	6. House

I never even made it to the door.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	7. Raven

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. 

Sitting at a table, calmly reading a book, was… an eerily familiar young woman dressed in black robes.

Three, light teal orbs orbited her—an automatic weapon?—as she calmly read a thick tome in the middle of an undead apocalypse. 

She looked my age, and had dark hair, with thick bangs that drew attention to her blue eyes. I would have remembered her, had she been on the plane.

I was about to ask for help, but she didn’t even look up from her book before interrupting me. “Just get on your way,” she said, detachedly. 

I thought I had imagined it, but the voice sealed it. “Maddie?” I asked. It had taken me long enough, but she looked like the same girl, aged up a couple years. The implications made me uncomfortable.

“You are thinking of somebody else. Leave me alone,” she replied, still with an uncaring cadence.

This seemed inspired by one of my games, so maybe… “Raven?”

She looked up at me then, with a suspicious gaze, her hand lowering to grasp something within her voluminous robes.

“So it’s you, then.” The tone of her voice had changed to one of deadly seriousness.

I had been avoiding guys with mohawks and slaying random zombie creatures trying to murder me, but this was some main quest shit right here. Had she detected the effects of the Game? I had the feeling the real plotline of this aventure was about to begin, and I didn’t know whether to feel excitement or dread. 

I was leaning towards dread, considering it was Maddie… 

She seemingly got bored of my staring at her. “Have a seat,” she said, pointing to a chair across her. 

I left the rusty machete at the edge of the counter as I sat. Not like it’d do a lot against whatever those orbs were.

I had to confirm things. “Do you know a Juniper Smith?” I asked.

“I do not,” replied Raven. “Is that your name?”

I nodded. So she obviously wasn’t my old… girlfriend? I felt too guilty to think of her as that. I wondered if the theme of this game was second chances, but I didn’t even really like her back on Earth, and if she was different, what was the point?

My theorizing stopped as Raven spoke, “Juniper, then. Could you help me with a moral dilemma?”

Straight to the point, then? “Sure, shoot.” I said, before realizing she might take it the wrong way. “Uh, that’s an expression.”

Raven looked at me as if I was an idiot, which might be fair. “Have you ever heard of a library that predicts the future?”

I had, as a matter of fact, designed such a thing. More concepts from my games? “The Boundless Library? A library that contains the books that will ever be written?”

She raised an eyebrow, “The name is wrong, but you know what it is,” she said. “Curious. I am its Head Librarian.” 

“Please don’t be offended, but you look younger than me,” I said.

“I am seventeen hundred years old,” replied Raven, unamused.

“Jesus, okay,” I felt a little better about my wandering thoughts now.

She quickly moved on. “The most important of our duties as keepers of the Infinite Library is the prevention of the destruction of Aerb. This dilemma concerns the end of the world, and I think you may be at its nexus.”

I didn’t remember that from my version. “And when is that?” I asked tentatively.

“The last book we were able to find after the last reset was published today. There was not a single sign concerning what the threat could be. But we had an entad, the Qullqa Inventory, largely useless until now, that finally bore some fruit.”

I was enraptured. The end of the world was a common plot device, but my magic items tended to be interesting. “What does it do?”

“It’s a gigantic hexagonal table with millions of strings emerging from its surface. The strings grow at a stable rate. We were able to notice knots in the strings, which we eventually identified as uses of unicorn magic in a specific location and time, and the hexagon as the hex itself. The entad is able to predict events a few hours into the future, but does not account for itself. The library decided to secure the Inventory, gambling on a situation just like this one.

“Four hours ago, a team assigned to it found an unprecedented event taking place in the future. A string that kept splitting, with this building as its epicenter.” Raven paused.

“Alternate timelines?” I asked.

Raven nodded. “The librarians panicked as they do, theorizing a new degenerate magic had been discovered, we had to contain it, and so forth. But a few of us realized the strings’ would fit an existing behavior—that of the Library itself, but taking place elsewhere.” She said. 

She seemed to be waiting for me to realize something. I didn’t get it. “So what does that mean, exactly?” I asked.

“Neither of us is real. We are being  _ predicted _ ,” said Raven.

That didn’t make any sense.

“That can’t be it. I am experiencing internal thoughts, there’s a definite sense of qualia.” I confirmed this by thinking the words ‘I am thinking these words’. So far, so good. 

Raven didn’t seem fazed, but she started speaking faster. “Similar claims are often heard from people within the alternate timelines, recorded within books. If these were real, it would mean trillions of lives are lost every time the fate of the world is changed. Luckily, they aren’t. Even if they did experience limited qualia, their world is already different from ours in subtle ways. The exclusionary principle stops applying, i-factor limitations become less strict.”

“I have no idea what any of those words mean,” I said, “But it sounds like you’re trying to convince yourself rather than me.” Surely she was aware of her own thoughts, unless her only role in this game was as an expository NPC. It terrified me she was wrong, considering her apparent authority.

Raven ignored me. “In the course of recent, desperate research, we have concluded there is a governing intelligence with nigh-absolute power over Aerb.” That’d be the Dungeon Master, if this game had one. “Such intelligence abandons Aerb and associated planes in predictive timelines, which leads to the cessation of the exclusionary principle. We consider this strong evidence of those timelines merely being simulated by the entity, unlike the phenomenology of unicorn magic, which  _ has _ led to exclusions.”

I wondered if I should tell her that  _ everything _ might be a simulation, but I held back at her intent expression.

“The Qullqa Inventory showed multiple splits at this location, the day the world presumably ends, new ones appearing even as I left the Library. Even if this wasn’t the cause of the end, for all we know, the splits might happen endlessly. Degenerately. If the process  _ uses  _ predictive timelines, the origin must be real, and it may lead to an exclusion. The exclusion of predictive timelines would destroy the Library, all we do to protect Aerb.”

It dawned on me, what she had chosen to do, why she was telling me so much, delaying the inevitable, why she had a thin sheen of sweat over her face despite her cool expression. She seemed to realize I knew, and raised her arm.

“I’m sorry.” In her defense, she really looked it as one of her orbs started an intercept course towards my running body, her dilemma resolved.

> [Go back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25636549/chapters/62233819)


	8. Output

I took a deep breath, slowly lowered the door handle, and pushed the door open with my foot just a crack to look inside. 

The view behind the door suddenly shifted, from the appearance of a rundown shop to white. Pure white, to the point I could no longer discern any features inside the room, walls or floors. 

Before I could turn around and run, I felt an invisible force take ahold of my limbs and walk me in. The door forcefully closed behind me with a slam.

Sitting at a table was a man I had never seen before. Bearded and looking older than me by a decade, the white hoodie he was wearing me surprised me the most. In contrasting black lettering, it said ‘Dice Dice Baby’.

The man gave me no time to collect myself.

“Welcome, Juniper. We—and this is the royal we, don’t get any crazy ideas—thank you for your feedback in this trying time. We hope you enjoy your improved experience in Aerb and grow to feel a sense of pride and accomplishment yadda yadda,” He paused with a thoughtful look, before continuing. “Actually, don’t get any crazy ideas from ‘royal’ either. Not everything is foreshadowing, you know,” He raised his eyebrows and wiggled his fingers. “…or is it?” 

The man was sitting in front of a table with multiple legal pads visibly filled with notes and a few writing utensils to the side. It reminded me of a job interview, not that I had any experience with those outside of TV.

He gave me no time to think, instead continuing to speak.

“Let’s see here.” He picked up a pad. “The most effusive feedback so far came from Juniper number 5. I have it noted down as ‘I like a princess who can beat me up’. Yikes, Juniper. This is bad even for you.”

“What the fuck is this? Who are you?” I asked. I looked around and noticed the white void extending into infinity, and the door gone. I half-expected Morgan Freeman to show up, but I guessed I had been saddled with this asshole with no fashion sense instead.

“It wouldn’t really be fair if you got stuck with a shitty first companion before you got past the tutorial, don’t you think? Even I don’t know everything,” he said. “Let’s skip the introduction, actually.”

The man made a finger gun, pointed at my head and made a pew sound with his mouth. Before I had any time to react, I noticed new memories swimming in my subconscious. I had been here before.

“You’re the guy who brought me to Aerb in the first place,” I said, “The Dungeon Master.”

“Correct,” he replied.

“I’ve opened this door nine times before?” I had distinct memories of that, but they were incompatible with each other.

“Sure. Technically you only get seven companions at the same time, but who knows how things will go in the future.” The man adopted a smug expression. “As a Dungeon Master, you should know that breathing room is key in our games, especially for your own mistakes.”

“So what am I doing here? Are you another potential companion?” I asked.

“That would be telling. No, you’re here as the control in this little experiment,” replied the DM.

A control meant, what, I was the Juniper who got no companions in Comfort? But surely the mechanics shop would be empty. I would have figured something out, unlocked Tinkering or a similar skill. I had no memory of this, however. 

(Wait, _Comfort_? Was the whole thing a pun based on the “zone of comfort” in the hero’s journey? My god, this DM was worse than Arthur.)

“You’re forgetting the corpse in the waiting room.” said the DM, interrupting my musings.

I started. “What corpse? There was no corpse in the waiting room…” My blood froze. _There was no corpse._

“Oh, come on! I was shot the moment I opened the door by that mohawk guy?” I said angrily. No companions meant no one had killed him in the first place. “That’s bad game design!” I pointed at the DM. “You are a bad dungeon master!”

“You could have parried the bullet, it’s right there in the rules.” The DM waved his hand at empty air. “If anything, this showcases the importance of teamwork.”

I gave him the finger. He ignored it.

“I think it’s time I wipe your memory and properly start things off. Is it safe to assume you prefer Amaryllis to your current circumstances?” He asked, tapping one of the legal pads.

I crossed my arms. “Sure, whatever. You know you designed her for me anyway,” I said. “And I’m definitely not choosing the lisping elf, he gave me the creeps. There’s no way he’d be a loyal companion.”

“You’d be surprised,” he said, and snapped his fingers.


End file.
